


Unwittingly

by Cumberbatch Critter (ivelostmyspectacles)



Series: Mommy and Daddy's World Hopping - Between the Pages [1]
Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fai & Kurogane being Fai & Kurogane except Fai's having a hard time, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Seresu/Celes, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 15:44:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4751927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivelostmyspectacles/pseuds/Cumberbatch%20Critter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>Fai awakes with a gasp, choking on the heavy air around him. For an instant, he can taste the blood from his dream, he can see Ashura-ou laid out across the ground in front of him, blood pouring from his neck, and Fai's hands are covered in blood - no, no. </p>
</blockquote><br/>In other words, Fai is having one hell of a hard time after leaving Celes again.
            </blockquote>





	Unwittingly

**Author's Note:**

> My timeline is a bit finicky on this. *narrows eyes* But the entire timeline of TRC is finicky at best, so I guess it's not that big of a deal? Hopefully nobody minds! Haha
> 
>  
> 
> also I'll be writing some more (immediate) post-Celes stuff, specifically Fai after Kurogane's arm 
> 
>  
> 
> I do not own _Tsubasa_. Thanks for reading, and since this is my first TRC fanfic, comments are highly appreciated! ^^

Fai awakes with a gasp, choking on the heavy air around him. For an instant, he can taste the blood from his dream, he can see Ashura-ou laid out across the ground in front of him, blood pouring from his neck, and Fai's hands are covered in blood - no, no.

Fai inhales shakily, so shakily. He can feel it shake him to the core, sending tremors through his body, and suddenly the room is too small, and the blankets are too constricting, and he cannot stay here any longer. So, he flings the blankets away and ghosts out of the room, bare feet cold and silent on the floor, hair falling in limp strands around his face.

His immediate choice is to go for the liquor, which he does, and takes it outside to the veranda and stares up at the moon and feels cold, _so_ cold.

Fai closes his eyes and forces himself to breathe.

A warm hand closing around his shoulder makes him jump, and his startled gasp is on the wrong side of dignified before he looks around. "Kuro-san..." He looks up at the man, who's impassive as always, and Fai feels completely shut down for a long, drawn-out moment before he snaps back into the usual regime. "What are you doing awake, Kuro-pii?" He inhales, this time in mock, feigned surprise. "Did Kuro-pii have a sixth sense that I took his liquor while he was asleep??"

Kurogane doesn't grace him with an eye roll or a retort. It unsettles Fai for a moment, before Kurogane leans down and plucks the bottle from Fai's hands, pouring himself a glass that he seemingly pulled out of nowhere. He sits down next to Fai and still doesn't say a word, and Fai looks back his own glass.

"... Kuro-pon isn't in the mood for conversation," he tries again. "Daddy just wanted Mommy to go without a drink, Daddy's so rude~"

"You were having nightmares."

Fai opens his mouth to speak and stops before the words can spill out. He had been planning another joke before Kurogane had spoken. How did he know that he had been dreaming unpleasant dreams?

"You were whimpering in your sleep."

Fai clamps down on the rush of emotion re-building in his chest, the sheer panic bubbling forward to his lips in a strangled sounding laugh. "Maybe I was just sad because Kuro-chii was being unreasonable to me!"

"Cut the crap." Kurogane's blunt, as he always is.

If there was one thing Fai could count on, it was Kurogane's bluntless. It was almost refreshing. Normally, it would make him smile. Now, it makes him bite the inside of his cheek in a touch of nerves, already too rattled from his disrupted sleep to keep up the charade much longer.

"You were dreaming about _him_."

For a brief moment, Fai almost laughs again. _Do you mean Ashura, or Yuui?_ Because it's either or, and either is just as likely. But he doesn't laugh. Because he feels like if he laughs now, his carefully composed mask will shatter, and he needs that. He _needs_ that protection, that thing to hide behind.

Fai licks his lips, and stares into his drink, and takes a sip of it with shaking hands holding the glass in lieu of actually responding to that statement. It was hard enough to keep that ridiculous grin plastered on his face right now, anyway; it took up all of his concentration.

"If you keep smiling into darkness," Kurogane says shortly, and without moving, "it might start smiling back."

Ha. Wasn't that the truth. "... I know," he says softly, and pretends he doesn't notice when his smile finally gives up, flickers out. He tilts his head down, and fails in not thinking, and lets his body slump to the left just a few inches so that his shoulder ends up braced against Kurogane's. He begs him without speaking to not say a word, and Kurogane, without hearing, listens.

　

* * *

 

Fai wakes up in the morning slung back into his bed, and he wonders if the whole thing was a dream. But his tongue still tastes like alcohol, and he feels woozy from lack of sleep, so he suspects that it wasn't. He then wonders if he fell asleep like that, last night.

"Kuro-taaan~," he singsongs, combing his fingers through his tangled hair as Kurogane comes back from wherever he had been. He may still be tired, but his emotional state had resettled after no more dreams. "Did I fall asleep with you last night?"

Kurogane gives him a death glare, which Fai grins at through the tendrils of hair that don't make it into the loose ponytail he's just put up.

Kurogane says nothing, and turns away to the travelling cape spread across his bed.

"And you carried me in here?" Fai wheedles, poking at Kurogane's shoulder.

Kurogane turns to look at him, crimson eyes unreadable. And then: "You drool when you sleep". He turns his attention away then.

It wasn't an admission, but it may as well have been one.

Fai beams. "Drooling is just a sign of my affection, Kuro-pippi! Your shoulder was just so comfy last night, I couldn't help myself!"

Kurogane growls under his breath - in good nature, Fai is sure, although Kurogane would never say as much - and abandons his task. He steps around Fai and heads to the doorway.

"Hey, wait! Where are you going?"

"Back downstairs."

Fai takes a deep breath. Still smiling. And maybe it isn't as fake this time.

"Wait up, Kuro-rin!"

"Would you stop with those stupid nicknames???"

Fai grins until his cheeks hurt, and until the genuine laughter building in his chest spills over, and he grabs for a pastry called doughtnut as Mokona does impressions of Kurogane and Kurogane makes a wild attempt to catch her as she runs across the bar, and Sakura tries to help cook breakfast while Syaoran watches her with wide, worried eyes.

So yeah. Maybe his smile isn't as fake. It may not be perfect. The nightmares may make it crumble, and they may take him off his guard. But these people make him smile again regardless, and maybe - _maybe_ \- his smile wasn't as forced as he thought it was, after all.

 


End file.
